The Pulse Within the Walls
by InkWorthy
Summary: The lead Cenobite is thrown into the depths of the Labyrinth, beyond his god's reach, and must find his way back up. The inner layers of the Labyrinth, however, are not so ordered or controlled as he is accustomed to, and even seems to be alive. He is not alone, however; Kirsty's been cast down with him. Pinsty survival AU. (Rated M for violence)
1. Chapter 1

The layers of the Labyrinth ran deep; storms within the walls guarded its secrets from those not meant to venture in. Stone stairways worked their way down, but the stone crumbled as the light above grew more distant, and even Cenobites did not know what waited past their own barriers. Lighting and stone flooring and common sense prevented them from going further down towards that enticing blue light beneath their feet.

Everyone - _all _of Leviathan's creations knew not to go towards the blue light. Beyond Leviathan's reach the Labyrinth was unpredictable; she was as wild with her creations as Leviathan was ordered with his, and the space between the Labyrinth's surface and her heart was occupied with all that had been left to fester in ages before. Even Leviathan himself wouldn't touch it. That, the Cenobite Prince thought to himself, was the genius of it all. He hated Angelique for it, but casting him down here was the perfect means to get him out of the way while she did... whatever it was she planned to do.

Perhaps it was his fault for assuming she would play somewhat fair.

Perhaps, the Prince thought to himself, he should have seen this coming. Angelique was as notorious for her guile as her temper, and she had used both to unexpected effect; perhaps, in different circumstances, he'd even have been impressed. These, however, were not the right circumstances to appreciate the cleverness of such a tactic.

No, he thought, standing over the dying form of some unspeakable beast that had tried to eat his heart from within his chest, the Cenobite Prince could not appreciate much of this at all. He craned his neck up, and the corridors of the Labyrinth spiraled upwards beyond what he could even see. He was perhaps a mile beneath the surface, far beyond contact of his Gash or even his god; the dimmest beam of Leviathan's gaze passed over the enclave, its reach only halfway to the depth the Prince found himself. He watched the beam pass, and felt the slightest twinge of panic; no one could find him.

He stepped back from the beast, which gurgled and dripped black blood from the wound in what he assumed was its neck. Truthfully he was unsure; he only knew it was what he'd grasped and he'd felt a pulse under his fingertips. That was enough for him to cut deep, and now the beast lay motionless at his feet. It was vaguely spider-shaped, but with too many legs and too many protrusions that might have been the head. And it was _melting._

He took a step back; the black blood was consuming and dissolving the carcass, and soon it was all one bubbling and noxious puddle that seeped into the stone below. The stone itself was rotted and crumbling; it was held together not by itself, but by networks of vines, or perhaps veins, that intertwined and weaved their way into every crack and every crevice they could find. Even further below the foundation was overgrown with them, and they blossomed into flowers that were full as roses and wet with something red and dark.

Perhaps, under better circumstances, he'd have found it quite beautiful. It was so rare for the Labyrinth to have flowers.

He needed to focus. These corridors were winding and overgrown and brimming with more forgotten beasts, but they obeyed the structure of the levels above them. There _would _be stairs. That was his primary concern at the moment, to find his way back up and warn his Gash of Angelique's presence. He needed to focus. Now, he thought to himself, he'd just come from another hall with promise, and this had proven to be a dead end. Returning to that point seemed the best course of action. He closed his eyes and willed himself to it.

The floor gave out beneath him; the Cenobite Prince opened his eyes in time to grab the edge of the floor, and he pulled himself up from crumbling stone and looked down. He'd _missed, _he'd aimed for the ground and had ended up on its very edge. Panic bloomed into an aching horror in his chest; he did not know this place enough to will himself _anywhere._ He was constrained to walking.

Would his chains even answer his call?

The weight of his tools hung at the Cenobite's waist as he stood, a small comfort. He could still use those to defend himself; a waste of artistry, but a necessity of he was to encounter more of those beasts. As he stood a vine tried to tangle with his fingers; he pulled his hand back and watched the vine disappear. His finger was scratched, and he watched a drop of dark blood form at his fingertip before spilling down his hand. This land was lawless, a Labyrinth beyond his recognition and understanding. He looked up again; somewhere above, his Gash was looking for him. perhaps his god was looking for him. But here, in these recesses of ages past, he was alone.

"Dammit!" The voice pierced the silence of his thoughts, and it was followed by a raspy shriek and a wet smack. "Get _away!" _That was a voice - a human voice, masked by the sounds of this cacophonous underworld. He closed his eyes - and stopped, opening them again, and starting towards it. When was the last time he'd needed to rush?

Though the halls were wide, they were winding, and he couldn't quite gauge where the sounds were coming from. He did know it was a struggle; blunt force and hissing and something thrown into a wall. He followed, and hastened his walk at the sound of another _squelch._

Leviathan have mercy, he prayed, let the human live. The Cenobite Prince turned the corner - and stared. The human woman stared back, holding a rock and standing over some sort of pulsing and multi-jawed worm. She was covered in purplish liquid, but that wasn't why he was staring.

"...Kirsty?" The Cenobite Prince almost couldn't believe his eyes. She away looked from him, to the rock in her hands, to the corridors spiraling above their heads.

"I don't..." she started, and her voice was ragged, "suppose... you know... how we're going to get out of here?" He sighed, closing his eyes again.

He was going to _kill _Angelique.

* * *

_New story! A big thank you to IdreamtofManderleyAgain, who provided the inspiration for this with a writing prompt! More to come soon!_


	2. Chapter 2

She'd thought the Labyrinth had shown her its worst. She'd thought what it had done to her uncle and stepmother, how it had warped them and the doctor had been the greatest terror she'd ever known - surely nothing could be worse than the desperation and hunger of the wicked. She'd been wrong.

Spiders. Fucking spiders were worse.

Kirsty didn't even realize how fast it had happened. One minute she'd been facing a _distractingly_ beautiful woman, the next the world went dark. How long she'd slept was unclear, because she woke to a sunless wilderness, visceral and reddish green. Like so much of this place, it was almost beautiful. And then it tried to kill her, and it decidedly wasn't.

The spiders didn't come until she'd gotten up and started walking; for the first half-hour she'd assumed this was one of _his _machinations, something conjured from a dream. It would be like the Cenobites to send temptation in such a lovely form; had she and the woman been having drinks? That might have been it. Drinks, and heading towards the woman's hotel room, and then... wham. She'd checked down a couple times just to make sure she actually was fully dressed; it seemed she and mystery lady hadn't gotten very far.

Probably for the best, all things considered, but it was still annoying.

Kirsty continued this line of thought as she navigated through lush, fleshy vegetation; it was as if viscera had taken root and blossomed into plant life, greens and reds and so, so many veins. She could only recognize it as the Labyrinth by the tiniest glimpses of stone walls between the layers and layers of growth, and because there was no other place this could logically be. She kept going in a straight line, reasoning that the Labyrinth's tendency of moving her around the first time would eventually get her where it wanted her to be; it was usually at the heart of the problem that she did her best work getting out of it.

Snapping flowers and bleeding vines did little to deter her as she walked; it was only when the ground gave under her that she screamed, falling into an entanglement of veins. She twisted and turned, clawing at the ropes holding her and tearing them open, their pulpy insides staining her white shirt a hideous brown. She tore herself free and staggered back, staring at the net and the hole she'd fallen through, and registered the word _trap _just before hearing the hissing noise.

_That _was when the spider showed up. Kirsty ducked; something flew overhead and when she looked up she saw legs and hairs and flesh and _teeth. _No eyes, just teeth pointed at her as the thing lunged forward again and she tossed herself aside, slamming into the nearby wall. It shook. Something moved under her back.

Loose brick.

She grabbed it and swung, and it hit the thing charging her with a heavy _thwak. _It staggered backwards, then hissed again.

_"Dammit!" _She screamed at the thing as it charged again, _"_Get _away!" _It jumped and she was slammed into the wall, but her arms were over her head and, more importantly, over the thing hissing in her face.

She brought it down and a loud _squelch _ended it. Kirsty stumbled back, away from the spider, and now that she looked at it the thing looked less like a spider and more like a worm, but a worm _covered _in teeth, and _walking _on teeth, and its guts were all over her. She was about to swear in revulsion when she heard something else move. She readied her rock when the approaching shadow turned the corner, and pitch-black eyes met hers between perfectly-gridded pins.

Oh, holy shit.

* * *

"So what is this place?"

It had taken five to ten minutes for the two to get on the same page; between Kirsty scraping bug goop off herself and trying to follow the Cenobite while the scenery tried to chew them up, they'd barely gotten any moments to speak. It seemed he was as on edge as she was, which was comforting, but also really, really wasn't.

"It is the Labyrinth," he said, stopping at a corner and looking around before continuing on, "but a Labyrinth beyond my understanding. We are in its lower depths, past the lighting that marks the edge of our existence."

"So that means what, exactly?" She'd never been happier to be wearing her old, "I'll replace them eventually" jeans; if she'd gotten her good pair dirty she'd have been upset on top of being confused and more than a little disoriented. These she would have _no _issue burning once she got out of here, provided she did."You don't know where we are?"

"That is the start of it," he said, looking up - what was he looking for? They hadn't stopped to come up with a game plan, but then, she barely had the presence of mind to do more than ask whatever question came into her head. It was all so _much. _"It goes deeper, though. My connection to Leviathan is weakened, and no other Cenobites have come down here."

"You mean recently?"

"I mean in our history."

Oh.

"So how do we get out of here, then?" She heard another hiss, and looked over her shoulder, but it was just some gassy flower deflating some distance away.

"We keep moving, and find stairs. We are closer to the Labyrinth's core; our only way out is up." Kirsty nodded and ducked under a cluster of vein-vines, and almost felt a bit calmer when something else occurred to her.

"Do you know how far away the nearest stairs are?" He stopped, and looked at her long enough for her nerves to sink in her stomach.

"I do not."

Shit.


	3. Chapter 3

The air was sickly-sweet, sticky in the way that wiping sweat from her brow only left Kirsty feeling clammier than before. She had already taken off her belt to tie her hair up and away from her neck; as they walked in silence she felt an aching desire to yank off her shirt and jeans, which clung to her like a bad date.

"How are you not overheating?" She asked, breaking the silence that had formed between them as the Cenobite led her through the tunnels surrounding them. It was the blind leading the blind, she knew; every now and then she would catch a glimpse of his face and see lines of concern, his eyes drifting over their surroundings with no spark of recognition igniting in them.

"I have learned to endure intensities of heat and humidity," he said, stopping to gaze at a higher structure that looked almost like an overgrown hallway, "though I admit I find this less than appealing, even as a new sensation." He would not make direct eye contact with her, hadn't since they'd run into each other, and she wondered if he was still grappling with the fact that he was as lost as her.

That had to be difficult, she thought to herself, to be in your own home and not recognize any of it.

"Who was that lady, anyway?" She was tired of walking in silence, and having some answers was better than none. The Cenobite led her around a corner.

"Angelique," he said, "one who once stood in a place of honor similar to my own. She fell from Leviathan's grace after fleeing to the human world in pursuit of pleasure beyond what he had given her, though her escape turned into entrapment by mortal desire." There really was no end to all this growth, was there? Kirsty kicked a climbing vine from her boot. "I suspect she believed the easiest way to reclaim her position of power and privilege was to remove the one she felt was holding it unfairly."

"That makes sense," Kirsty ducked under a web after him, though she felt some stick to her hair, "but why throw me in too?" The Cenobite stopped, and looked at her, eyes holding something like amusement as he finally met her gaze.

"You've acquired a reputation, Kirsty, within the walls of this realm." She felt her eyebrows arch in interest. "It is not often that anyone causes such change as killing not one, but two residents of the Labyrinth, as well as inspire the death of four others." Her shoulders sagged, heavy with guilt; she'd really been hoping that wouldn't come up.

"I was just trying to stay alive," she said, "I never meant for him to-"

"I know," he said when she stopped to find the right words, "that is why I said inspired. It was our choice, Kirsty, to hold Channard off and allow you time to escape. You gave us our humanity; the least we could do was preserve yours." She wanted to ask if he really meant "we" or if it was just him, but she'd have to take it for the time being; there were infinitely more urgent problems to deal with. She nodded.

"Well... thank you for doing that." She pushed a stray curl from her face. "But that still doesn't explain why she would target me."

"Humans of note are rare in the Labyrinth, and your story is entangled with mine. perhaps she feared our temporary alliance would mean you'd notice if something happened to me, and would attempt to rectify it." He turned and started to walk again, out of the canopy and toward a more open space. "I believe she saw you as a threat."

"But I'm not interested in being a threat." Kirsty frowned. "If she's so powerful and dangerous, couldn't she just tear me apart like you promised to?"

He looked as if he might debate her on that point, but she saw something behind his head. "What's that up there?"

He turned, and Kirsty watched the thinnest shred of shadow pass over the wall across an abyss before them. The Cenobite raised his hand and snapped, but nothing happened; it took her a moment to realize he had tried to conjure his chains.

But... he couldn't.

"The gaze of Leviathan," he said, "just out of our reach. Were my Father to see us, we could follow his guidance to the surface. As it is, I do not know if he even realizes we are down here." Kirsty looked around; it looked like the spiraling and gridded staircases of before, but overwrought with plant life. "We must find our way up ourselves."

"Like there?" He turned to where Kirsty was pointing, to a modest stairway up one tier. It was so covered in growth she had barely seen it at first.

"Yes." He walked with her towards it, and soon it became clear why she hadn't seen it; it was _crawling _with those moving vines. She grimaced at the thought of them tangling with her ankles, but the Cenobite took a knife from his waist and strode forward.

She watched, almost enthralled, as he almost effortlessly sliced through the fleshy and brown-filled vines. They resisted his blade, but his expression betrayed nothing even as the plant matter was sliced and tossed aside. When he stepped back, most that hadn't been cut apart retreated to the walls, seeming to hiss in displeasure.

"Shall we?" He gestured to the stairs, and Kirsty nodded and followed him up, stopping only to glance down on the vines that regrew and sealed the opening behind them.


End file.
